Having shot down around a dozen MQ-9 Reaper drones, Yemeni fighters also forced pilots of the “most advanced” and “stealth” US jet to break a sweat dodging their missiles.
An F-35 fighter jet was “nearly struck by Houthi air defenses” earlier this spring, reported The New York Times on May 12, citing US officials.
The War Zone elaborated: the stealth jet “had to take evasive maneuvers to avoid being hit by Houthi surface-to-air (SAM) missiles.”
It remains unclear which missile — or how many — were launched, according to TMZ. Despite being labelled as “rudimentary,” the Houthis’ air defense system employs unconventional passive infrared sensors and other tech, reportedly giving the “invisible” F-35 aircraft a headache.
Social Media is Melting Down
“Lots of interesting takeaways from [the NYT] piece, but the winner has to be ‘multiple US officials’ confirming the Houthis nearly shot down an F-35, the most advanced aircraft ever built,” quipped Eurasia Group analyst Gregory Brew on X.
“It now makes all the more sense as to why Israel dared not go anywhere near Iran’s border with its own F-35Is: the West knows their planes are in fact detectable by the radars of the resistance,” suggested blogger and X influencer Simplicius.
‘Most Advanced Aircraft Ever Built’?
The much-hyped F-35 program is projected to cost over $2 trillion throughout its lifetime.
Yet for all that money, the F-35 keeps malfunctioning — the latest crash occurred as recently as January.
“The F-35 design was broken at the requirements level,” Tesla CEO Elon Musk said bluntly last year.
Matt Gaetz, a former US congressman and Trump’s initial pick for attorney general, called the F-35 “a $100 million paperweight”, while Rep. Adam Smith, a senior Democrat, called the F-35 program a “rathole” in 2021.
So much tax payer money – the lion part – thrown away for men playing ” soldiers”.
Their need to dominate and subjugate others is taking the human race to extinction
Trump lied over a week ago when claiming that the Houthi had capitulated. He was just preaching to his loyal converted fools. The truth is that the USA capitulated to the Houthi in the Red Sea and suffered their first ever naval defeat in 80 years.
While the USA wants world domination, the Houthi don’t and simply improve their technologies to protect themselves from global bullies.
The Chinese J-20 is more than a match for the US F-35
The USA have known for ages that the F-35 is a dog. They also know that others have caught up with 5th gen technology and are now developing the F-47 as a 6th gen fighter.